Van Tulder, Rob; Grøgaard, Birgitte & Lunnan, Randi (2024)
Walking the talk? : MNEs transitioning towards a sustainable world
Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
Across the globe, concerns escalate about the effects of greenhouse gas emissions on global climate conditions, implications on global trade from pandemics, and the destruction of ecosystems from the exploitation of limited and non-replaceable global resources. Politicians and businesses alike agree that something must be done, the question is what, how, when, and by whom? What should firms do to reduce their carbon footprint while continuing to secure jobs and profits? When should firms make decisions to transform their businesses given the uncertainty of markets as well as the lack of clear guidance from global institutions? In this volume we ask: Are we actually walking the talk? This volume includes select contributions from the 2022 EIBA conference in Oslo, as well as a number of invited contributions. The book is a tribute to Professor Alain Verbeke who has contributed substantially to the theme of ‘walking the talk’ in the IB community. The chapters in this volume illustrate a broad spectre of research questions and ways to answer them within the IB community that provide evidence that many types of actors are taking – or can take - steps to actually “walk the talk”. The contributions also show, however, that MNEs face considerable challenges to make their ambitions real, which in turn presents a challenge for IB scholarship to develop relevant and robust analytical approaches to cover the transition problems that MNEs face.
Stensaker, Inger G.; Colman, Helene Loe & Grøgaard, Birgitte (2023)
The dynamics of union-management collaboration during postmerger integration
Collaboration between unions and management may facilitate postmerger integration, however collaboration can also be time-consuming and challenging. Using a qualitative case study, we examined union–management collaboration in the integration of two Norwegian firms. The integration was split into two processes, involving different business units. While both processes were designed according to similar principles of collaboration, we observed the emergence of two diverging integration trajectories. Whereas the first process was characterized by a virtuous cycle of trust and constructive collaboration that facilitated integration, the second process turned into a vicious cycle of mistrust and conflict, causing disruption, and impeding integration. Based on our inductive analysis, we identify four distinctive features characterizing the emerging mode of collaboration. We develop a model to illustrate the dynamics of union-management collaboration in postmerger integration. These findings expand the current understanding of merger and acquisition (M&A) dynamics to include a broader set of actors and potential conflict factors in the integration process. Furthermore, our study suggests that collaborative integration processes require careful management while also potentially posing challenges for unions, particularly in the context of historical conflicts.
Zeng, Rong (Ratchel); Grøgaard, Birgitte & Björkman, Ingmar (2023)
Navigating MNE control and coordination: A critical review and directions for future research
Control and coordination efforts are at the heart of MNE functioning. Yet, our review reveals that the literature on MNE control and coordination lacks conceptual clarity, which may hamper the development of the field. In this critical review, we synthesize the literature over the past decade using a conceptual framework rooted in new internalization theory. Research remains fairly coarse regarding how various configurations and interactions of control and coordination mechanisms affect intended outcomes. We note a paucity of multilevel studies, direct investigations of microfoundations, and comparison studies between intra- and inter-MNE relationships. Insufficient attention has been paid to adaptation issues and the impact of external dynamics on the need for, and operationalization of, control and coordination mechanisms. These gaps are concerning, since external trends are changing the organizational landscape and MNE boundaries are becoming increasingly fuzzy. Going forward, a more nuanced conceptualization of outcomes is needed, one that specifies proximal outcomes which mediate the achievement of distant goals. We use our augmented conceptual framework to identify other key areas for future research. We also call for more research on how disruptive forces affect both the use and outcomes of organizational mechanisms aimed at achieving control and coordination.
The dominant narrative about the rise of international business (IB) focuses on early research and the institutionalization of a new academic field. In this study, we explore the role of case writing in the field’s formative period from the mid-1950s to the mid-1960s. Based on an analysis of teaching cases on IB topics, we demonstrate that case-based teaching, including the writing of cases, was an innovative pedagogical method that made a strong impact on the formation of the new academic field. Analyzing the cases and the background and affiliation of their authors offers new insights into the linkages to other disciplines from which the new academic field emerged. The analysis of the cases also provides new insight into how the case authors connected to the new practical experiences from an increasing number of multinational enterprises, particularly from the US, and conceptualized the experiences into a pedagogical language. The investigation covers 489 cases written by scholars located in 18 countries from the early 1950s to 1963, as well as archival studies of the business schools and institutions that initiated the production of cases.
Colman, Helene Loe; Grøgaard, Birgitte & Stensaker, Inger G. (2022)
Organizational identity work in MNE subsidiaries: Managing dual embeddedness
Scholarly efforts to propose future directions for international business (IB) research have generated a timely and extensive inventory of potentially interesting areas of research. We supplement this line of inquiry by suggesting that an additional layer of scrutiny could be beneficial when advocating in favor of giving more attention to particular research realms. Specifically, we advance several guiding principles that will help IB scholars assess which research areas merit greater scholarly attention, based on their potential importance and impact. We distinguish between (1) research in new or underdeveloped research domains, where salience, urgency, and actionability are critical elements, and (2) new research in relatively well-established domains, where scholars may contribute to changing the theoretical conversations taking place in IB.
Bass, Erin & Grøgaard, Birgitte (2021)
The long-term energy transition: Drivers, outcomes, and the role of the multinational enterprise
The pre-eminence of the production and consumption of nonrenewable fossil fuels is waning with the growth of renewable energy solutions. This long-term energy (LTE) transition is one of the global grand challenges, characterized by uncertain and evolving markets. Although this is a global issue, there are regional differences and non-linear trajectories that suggest that the LTE transition is a complex challenge for firms and countries. For international business scholars, questions related to the role and effect of multinational enterprises in the context of the LTE transition have opened new avenues for advancing theoretical, managerial, and policy understanding. Thus, we advance this body of research by presenting a framework that delineates important drivers and outcomes of the transition. In this way, we emphasize how MNEs both influence and are being influenced by the LTE transition. We identify theoretical perspectives that may be useful to address LTE transition challenges, and suggest avenues for future research on this global grand challenge.
Gooderham, Paul N.; Grøgaard, Birgitte & Foss, Kirsten (2019)
Global Strategy and Management: Theory and Practice
Edward Elgar Publishing.
Grøgaard, Birgitte; Colman, Helene Loe & Stensaker, Inger G. (2019)
Legitimizing, leveraging, and launching: Developing dynamic capabilities in the MNE
Multinational enterprises (MNEs) face simultaneous pressures for global integration and local responsiveness. While the extant literature acknowledges that most MNEs are neither entirely geared towards achieving global integration nor local responsiveness, scarce attention is given to how MNEs develop organizational flexibility to address multiple and shifting strategy pressures over time. In this paper, we draw on the dynamic capabilities literature to explore how the MNE develops the capabilities needed to achieve this flexibility. Through a qualitative, longitudinal case study spanning 12 years, we identify three recombination capabilities – legitimizing, leveraging, and launching capabilities – through which the MNE develops organizational flexibility. We find that these recombination capabilities improve the MNEs ability to sense and seize new opportunities and enable the MNE to overcome organizational impediments to achieve flexibility. Our study offers a process perspective that shows how the three capabilities together nourish the MNEs resilience to continuously balance between global integration and local responsiveness. Our findings have managerial implications, illustrating that launching new strategic initiatives may fail if the MNE does not have the capabilities to legitimize the new initiatives and to ensure that existing organizational strengths are properly leveraged to support the new initiatives.
Grøgaard, Birgitte; Rygh, Asmund & Benito, Gabriel R G (2019)
Bringing corporate governance into internalization theory: State ownership and foreign entry strategies
We use internalization theory to analyze the establishment and entry mode decisions of state-owned (SOE) and privately owned (POE) enterprises. We enrich internalization theory by building on insights from economic theory of corporate governance and taking into account particular characteristics of SOEs such as non-economic motivations, long-term orientation, and different risk preferences. We examine foreign entries over a 10-year period in the Canadian oil and gas industry. This single-country and single-industry context features foreign SOEs and POEs from a wide range of home countries, allowing a focused study of the combined influence of state ownership and home-country factors. Compared to POEs, SOEs tend to prefer acquiring stand-alone assets rather than firms, and to take lower ownership shares. We also find that differences between SOEs and POEs diminish when home countries are characterized by high government quality and market orientation and identify differences between types of SOEs, with partially owned SOEs exhibiting behaviors more similar to POEs than fully owned SOEs. We demonstrate how our enrichment of internalization theory strengthens its predictive and explanatory capacity. Our results also show that SOEs from strong and market-oriented institutional environments are similar to POEs and can be studied using the traditional internalization theory.
Aguilera, Ruth V. & Grøgaard, Birgitte (2019)
The dubious role of institutions in international business: A road forward
The MNE integration literature lacks coherence in the use and effectiveness of different integration mechanisms. In this study, we use meta-analytic techniques to quantitatively synthesize and evaluate the impact of centralization, formalization and socialization on knowledge transfer. Our analysis of 89 independent samples, including 15,506 subsidiaries, shows that socialization facilitates knowledge transfer more strongly than centralization and formalization. Socialization substitutes for formalization’s positive impact, and mitigates centralization’s negative impact on knowledge transfer. We further identify that directionality of knowledge flows is key in explaining the impact of centralization mechanisms. Finally, we point out important systemic problems in current empirical research.
Grøgaard, Birgitte & Colman, Helene Loe (2016)
Interpretive Frames as the Organization’s “Mirror”: From Espoused Values to Social Integration in MNEs
MIR. Management International Review: journal of international business, 56(2), s. 171- 194. Doi: 10.1007/s11575-015-0273-4
Gooderham, Paul N.; Nordhaug, Odds dødsbo & Grøgaard, Birgitte (2014)
The Multinational Company
Jordahl, Atle; Rønning, Rune & Espedal, Bjarne (red.). Leadership Development in Multinational Companies
Grøgaard, Birgitte; Gioia, Carmine & Benito, Gabriel R G (2013)
An Empirical Investigation of the Role of Industry Factors in the Internationalization Patterns of Firms
International Studies of Management and Organization, 43(1), s. 81- 100. Doi: 10.2753/IMO0020-8825430104
Colman, Helene Loe & Grogaard, Birgitte (2013)
Integration Vacuum: Creating Action Space for Global Strategy Implementation in International Acquisitions
Thunderbird International Business Review, 55(4) Doi: 10.1002/tie.21553
Gooderham, Paul N.; Grøgaard, Birgitte & Nordhaug, Odd (2013)
International Management: Theory and Practice
Edward Elgar Publishing.
Gooderham, Paul N.; Nordhaug, Odd & Grøgaard, Birgitte (2013)
Divergent Norwegian and North American HRM Regimes:Implications for Norwegian MNEs
Parry, Emma; Stavrou, Eleni & Lazarova, Mila (red.). Global Trends in Human Resource Management
Grøgaard, Birgitte & Verbeke, Alain (2012)
Twenty key hypotheses that make internalization theory the general theory of international strategic management
Verbeke, Alain & Merchant, Hemant (red.). Handbook of research on international strategic management
Grøgaard, Birgitte (2012)
Alignment of strategy and structure in international firms: An empirical examination
Grøgaard, Birgitte; Verbeke, Alain & Zargarzadeh, Amin M. (2011)
Entrepreneurial deficits in the multinational enterprise
Verbeke, Alain; Tavares Lehmann, Ana Teresa & Van Tulder, Rob (red.). Entrepreneurship in the Global Firm
Colman, Helene Loe & Grøgaard, Birgitte (2011)
Nationality as basis for global identity
Colman, Helene Loe; Stensaker, Inger & Tharaldsen, Jorunn Elise (red.). A Merger of Equals? The Integration of Statoil and Hydro`s Oil & Gas Activities
Grøgaard, Birgitte & Benito, Gabriel R.G. (2007)
The Internationalization Patterns of Norwegian Firms: Does Industry Matter?
Multinationals on the Periphery, Gabriel R.G. Benito & Rajneesh Narula (eds)
Eliassen, Kjell A. & Grøgaard, Birgitte (2007)
Internationalisation
Eliassen and From (eds), The Privatisation of European Telecommunications
Benito, Gabriel R.G.; Grøgaard, Birgitte & Narula, Rajneesh (2003)
Environmental influences on MNE subsidiary roles: economic integration and the Nordic countries
Journal of International Business Studies, 34, s. 443- 456.
The untold story: Teaching cases on multinational enterprises in US business schools and the rise of International Business as a new academic field, 1955-1963
[Academic lecture]. European International Business Academy Annual Conference 2021.
The Effect of Institutional Distances and Government Assistance on Ownership Levels in Sub-Saharan African Countries
[Academic lecture]. 38th Annual Conference of the Strategic Management Society in Paris 2018.
We follow the prevalence of MNEs into Africa to examine the impact of institutional distance and governmental assistance on ownership levels across multiple home and host countries. Although recent studies have increasingly heightened the influence of institutional contextual factors on the ownership levels, we know very little about such decisions from the African context. This paper fills this gap by looking at ownership decisions within the uniqueness of the African context. We contribute to the international business literature by testing the theoretical boundaries of ownership decisions when MNEs expand into high risk areas. With 54 countries in our sample, this study throws light on the role of different institutional complexities on ownership decisions.
Grøgaard, Birgitte; Colman, Helene Loe & Stensaker, Inger G. (2018)
Addressing Multiple Competitive Pressures in the MNE through Recombination
[Academic lecture]. Academy of Management Conference.
Zeng, Rong & Grøgaard, Birgitte (2017)
Entrepreneurial deficits in MNE subsidiaries: Opening the black box
[Academic lecture]. Academy of International Business.
Grøgaard, Birgitte; Colman, Helene Loe & Stensaker, Inger G. (2017)
DEVELOPING ORGANIZATIONAL FLEXIBILITY IN A MULTINATIONAL ENTERPRISE: THE KEY TO COMBINING GLOBAL INTEGRATION AND LOCAL RESPONSIVENESS
[Academic lecture]. EIBA.
Grøgaard, Birgitte; Colman, Helene Loe & Stensaker, Inger G. (2017)
Building dynamic capabilities for organizational flexibility in MNEs to combine global integration and local responsiveness
[Academic lecture]. Strategic Management Society Special Conference.
Grøgaard, Birgitte; Colman, Helene Loe & Stensaker, Inger G. (2016)
The Journey to Become a Transnational: A Case Study of the ‘Forgotten’ Strategy
[Academic lecture]. SMS Annual Conference.
Grøgaard, Birgitte (2016)
A meta-analysis of integration mechanism outcomes in multinational enterprises (co-authored with Zeng, R. and Steele, P.)
[Academic lecture]. EIBA Annual Conference.
Grøgaard, Birgitte (2016)
Flip Factory Inc. Teaching Note Ontario, Canada: IVEY Publishing (case number 8B16M071).
[Report]. IVEY Publishing.
Grøgaard, Birgitte (2016)
Flip Factory Inc. Ontario, Canada: IVEY Publishing (case number 9B16M071).
[Report]. IVEY Publishing.
Colman, Helene Loe; Stensaker, Inger G. & Grøgaard, Birgitte (2015)
Navigating Through the Jungle: Integration in the Multinational Enterprise
[Academic lecture]. Academy of Management Conference.
Grøgaard, Birgitte; Rygh, Asmund & Benito, Gabriel R G (2015)
SOE strategic behavior when entering competitive host markets
[Academic lecture]. Academy of International Business 2015 Annual Meeting.
Grøgaard, Birgitte; Rygh, Asmund & Benito, Gabriel R G (2015)
SOE strategic behaviour when entering competitive host markets
[Academic lecture]. Reading-UNCTAD International Business Conference 2015.
Grøgaard, Birgitte; Rygh, Asmund & Benito, Gabriel R G (2014)
When in Rome? An empirical examination of SOE strategic behavior when entering a competitive host market
[Academic lecture]. European International Business Academy Annual Conference.
Stensaker, Inger G.; Colman, Helene Loe & Grogaard, Birgitte (2012)
PERCEPTIONS OF FAIRNESS IN A MERGER OF EQUALS: THE ROLE OF INTERACTIONAL JUSTICE
[Academic lecture]. Academy of Management.
Stensaker, Inger G.; Colam, H. L & Grogaard, Birgitte (2012)
Attaining Perceptions of Fairness in a Merger of Equals
[Academic lecture]. Academy of Management Conference..
Grøgaard, Birgitte & Colman, Helene Loe (2012)
Identifying international strategies through content analysis
[Academic lecture]. Academy of International Business Annual Conference.
Grøgaard, Birgitte & Colman, Helene Loe (2012)
Implementing Normative Integration in MNEs: The Impact of Organizational Identity
[Academic lecture]. Strategic Management Society Conference.
Colman, Helene Loe; Grøgaard, Birgitte & Stensaker, Inger G. (2012)
SUBSIDIARY IDENTITY CONSTRUCTION: MANAGING BOUNDARIES, DISTINCTIVENESS AND RELATIONSHIPS
[Academic lecture]. European International Business Academy (EIBA) 2012 Conference.
Colman, Helene Loe; Stensaker, Inger G. & Grøgaard, Birgitte (2011)
Integration Practices and Perceptions of Justice in a Merger of Equals
[Academic lecture]. Academy of Management Annual Conference.
Grøgaard, Birgitte (2009)
StatoilHydro Canada: Prospects and challenges from a subsidiary perspective.
[Report]. International Research Institute of Stavanger.